Productive player, lazy player.

"You should want the guy on the field helping his team win instead of making an unnecessary show out of sprinting for the sake of public perception. And Cano, through his supposedly unacceptable explanations, seems to realize that. It’s not lazy, it’s smart."

Of course I don't want a player to get hurt. I fail to see how running 90 feet is a dangerous act. If it is, then every motion on the baseball field is dangerous and the only way to avoid injury is to avoid playing altogether.

As for the statistical GP analysis of Cano vs. Jeter, plenty of players (Pete Rose comes to mind) hustled and also played long careers.


But let's say, for argument's sake, that Cano has avoided injury by jogging to first base. Let's pretend that Cano's lack of hustle is the intelligent result of his own cost-benefit analysis. He wants to stay healthy, and that's why he jogs on infield grounders. He's not lazy, he's "smart." (I almost choked on those words, simply because of the mere implication that Cano thoughtfully analyzed this in the first place.)

How do you explain jogging on doubles ... getting thrown out at second base on line drives off the wall?

How do you explain his unwillingness to catch throws from the catcher on attempted steals?

Or his unwillingness to dive after ground balls?

How do you explain his lack of stolen bases? Cano's 162-game average is 4 stolen bases with 3 caught stealing. Thurman Munson had more stolen bases per year. Thurman Munson had three nicknames according to baseball-reference.com: Tugboat, Squatty Body, and the Walrus.

How do you explain getting caught twice in one season on the Jeff Nelson fake-to-third, throw-to-first pickoff move? Twice! In one season! That has to be a record. Was that a smart play because the possibility of running 270 more feet was too much for his hamstrings to take?

Is he a $24 million-per-year DH who will never get an infield hit or take an extra base?

Because if running the bases and playing the field is too dangerous for a professional baseball player, I'm not too sure what's left. Walking (which he doesn't do too often) and hitting homeruns.


Look, on balance, Cano's positives far outweigh his negatives.

But please don't call me crazy for pointing out the obvious all these years; please don't turn laziness into an asset; and please, please, please, most of all, PLEASE don't insult my intelligence by proclaiming Cano's lack of hustle is a well-thought-out strategy.

I don't doubt that Cano spends a lot of time in the batting cage. Like I said before, that activity can only be described as "work" to a professional baseball community who has forgotten what "work" is.